Thesis (Ph. Ed.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 2001. / Vita. UMI number: 3016514. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 50-52). Also available online (World Wide Web).

One of the fastest growing areas of law enforcement in the state of Texas today is school district policing, with many of the Independent School District (ISD) departments having been formed within the past 10-12 years. Without a formal structured plan of its own, training programs for the school district police officer have often followed the template of other local and state policing organizations to determine their own in-service training curriculum. Unfortunately, following the guidelines and programs set up by these outside policing organizations has led to training that is not indicative of the school district police officers bona fide training needs. This research first focused on identifying the internal and external constraints that are operating from within the school district, along with influences from outside the organization that are hindering ISD police officer training. The results found budgetary issues, time issues, perceived lack of training support from the school district administration, a lack of a training needs analysis to identify training needs, and other outside constraints (such as legislative training mandates), were hindering ISD police in-service training. Recommendations were made to seek outside assistance (grants), combined regional training efforts, organizing to seek changes in required state training mandates, educating administration in ISD policing needs, and performing a training needs analysis to identify training needs. The second focus identified the unique tasks of the school district police officer in order to provide the school district policing organizations with specific task information regarding the daily tasks of the school district police officer. Twenty eight unique police officer tasks were then identified through group sessions held with several ISD policing organizations. The tasks were then listed in order of criticality and frequency, and two lists were made from the returns. One related to overall task importance and the second list was ordered by agency size, as it was believed that the agencies may differ in focus and responsibilities by departmental size. This combination of an organizational analysis and a task analysis is expected to provide the ISD policing organizations with the information from which a sound training program may be designed.

It is argued that housing is a fundamental element in successful community care programmes for people who have a long-term mental illness, but that the significance of the immediate living environment on the individual's psych- social well-being has been underestimated in the formulation and implementation of policy. Using a grounded theory approach. Part One reports an exploratory study of the catchment area of one psychiatric hospital, which included parts of three health districts and three local authority areas. The study examined in detail, with a focus on housing, the operation of services for mentally disabled people , the plans for creating locally-based facilities, and the implementation of those plans in the mid-1980's, by means of a combination of documentary evidence and key informant interviews. All three parts of the study area were found to have encountered major but differing problems. Wide variations between and within local areas in policy and resources were found, but most stiking was the emergence of two distinct key informant perspectives: those of policy makers/managers, and workers in face-to-face contact with mentally disabled people, indicative of separate discourses of rights and needs. Part Two sets up a model of three functions of housing based on psychological needs, and argues for a compensatory role for housing in community care, which is contrasted with the reality of increasing difficulty in meeting even basic survival needs. It is suggested that the emphasis on negative rights of much mental health reform was inadequate to ensure that needs were met when the welfare net began to contract, and renewed emphasis on citizenship and social rights is proposed as a means to represent more adequately the housing needs of mentally disabled people at the levels of policy and service planning.

Children who have multiple disabilities often have complex communicational needs (Crickmay 1966; Orelove & Sobsey, 1996; Van Riper & Erickson, 1996; Workinger 2005). To augment or supplement these children’s communication skills some form of alternative and augmentative communication (AAC) may be provided (Beukleman & Mirenda, 2005; Downing, 1996; Orelove & Sobsey, 1996; Stephenson & Dowrick, 2005). However it has been found that parents fear AAC will prevent focus on verbal output which is the preferred way of communication (Allaire et al 1991; Beukelman & Mirenda, 2005; Schlosser, 2003; Stephenson & Dowrick, 2005). This study investigated the impact of a combined therapy approach on the phonetic repertoire of children with multiple disabilities. In addition, changes in communication intent were also explored. Each child received intervention across four, 20-30 minute sessions per week for six weeks. Results show that all of the children made improvements, however not all changes were significant. Clinical implications of the study include the notion that working on traditional therapy techniques can improve the speech and language of children who have multiple disabilities and there is a need to look further at traditional therapies and incorporate AAC into these

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This thesis presents the result of a study on learning difficulties among primary school children carried out in Lagos State of Nigeria. The study determined teachers' perceptions of special education, determined whether primary school children had learning difficulties, the relative proportion of children who have learning difficulties and the types of learning difficulties that they have. It described how the children's needs were met and how appropriate the provisions made to meet these needs were. In addition it evaluated the implications of the research findings for teacher education. The results of the survey, which was carried out by means of research interviews and survey questionnaires, showed that the teachers' perceptions of special education were not well articulated. They recognised children's learning difficulties, but would not regard these as special educational needs. The teachers indicated that about 21% of primary school children had learning difficulties. They identified five major types of learning difficulties, namely cognitive; specific; language; emotional and behavioural difficulties and difficulties arising from exceptional abilities. Negligible numbers of children with physical, sensory and mental disabilities (under 1.0%) were also identified. The teachers indicated that there was no policy on identification and intervention for children with learning difficulties. Individual schools and individual teachers adopted their own methods of identification and intervention. The study concluded with recommendation for special needs education legislation. The legislation should among other things, direct on a statutory Code of Practice for the effective management and administration of special educational needs in schools; a revised teacher training curriculum to include special education components; and enlightenment programmes to raise awareness around disability and special needs issues. This work also contains the results of a mini survey carried out in 11 pre-schools on the implementation of the special educational needs Code of Practice as the institution study, a requirement of the doctorate in education programme. The mini survey determined training needs on the Code of Practice for pre-school settings. An abstract appropriate to the institution study is indicated in front of the institution study itself.

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